Angels owner Arte Moreno says a Mike Trout extension is still ‘in the front of your mind,’ but no talks yet

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For all of Mike Trout’s individual accomplishments, the two-time AL MVP, right, has been to the postseason just once in seven MLB seasons. With two years left on his contract, the clock is ticking for team owner Arte Moreno and the Angels to sign him to an extension. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

ANAHEIM — As the clock ticks away on Mike Trout’s contract, Arte Moreno would only say that he hears it.

“Sometimes you have things in the back of your mind, and sometimes you have things in the front of your mind,” the Angels owner said Monday, at the press conference to introduce new manager Brad Ausmus. “That’s one of those things that’s always in the front of your mind.”

Although there’s been speculation, and a natural assumption, that the Angels would begin negotiating an extension with Trout this winter, Moreno said nothing has happened so far.

“We have not talked about it,” Moreno said. “We all communicate. He just had, personally, a real rough end of the year. We’re giving him a lot of space. We just want him and his family to go through the grieving process, so we all try to support each other.”

Trout’s brother-in-law, former Angels prospect Aaron Cox, died in August.

Trout, 27, will make $34 million each of the next two seasons. He has said that he isn’t yet thinking about his future, beyond saying that the most important thing to him is winning. The Angels have made the playoffs just once in his seven full seasons.

Moreno sounded optimistic about making improvements this winter.

“I’m not going to tell you that we’re going to spend a ton of money, but we’re going to spend money,” he said, adding that “there is, realistically, a budget. It’s not an endless thing, like a fantasy draft.”

Although the Angels don’t share their budget publicly, it is believed they have somewhere around $30 million to spend on new players if they want to keep the payroll around where it was in 2018.

“We need starting pitching,” he said. “Bullpen help. We blew a lot of games in the last two or three innings. We need more depth in the bullpen.”

Offensively, Moreno said the Angels need “a left-handed bat with some power who can play first base, just to fill in.”

The Angels have Albert Pujols at first, but he’s coming off knee surgery, so they likely need some coverage if he’s unavailable.

Jeff Fletcher has covered the Angels since 2013. Before that, he spent 11 years covering the Giants and A's and working as a national baseball writer. Jeff is a Hall of Fame voter. In 2015, he was elected chairman of the Los Angeles chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America.